August 29, 2020 | Matthew 26:14–56 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue Many years ago I attended a student’s sweet sixteen party at a luxurious hotel banquet hall. It was a beautiful event. However, on Monday this same young woman walked into my classroom in tears. She explained that when she got home that evening her […]
August 18, 2020 | Luke 10:1-23 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue Anyone who teaches will tell you that not every day is easy. You can have the most carefully prepared lesson plan, the most tried-and-true activity on your agenda, and still, your students may be irritable and inattentive. A key part of training future teachers is […]
August 13, 2020 | Romans 12:9–21 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue During the Vietnam War, for the first time, people had the opportunity to visually “see” the realities of war. The nightly news showed footage of each day’s violence, and suddenly war became up close and personal. Horrified by what they saw, people wanted to take […]
August 11, 2020 | Luke 19:1-9 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue As a classroom teacher for sixteen years, I learned to recognize my students’ social, emotional, and academic needs. Teaching to change lives was as much about what happened outside of the lesson plan as the lesson plan itself. As I spent time purposefully recognizing my […]
August 8, 2020 | John 4 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue New teachers are often trained in what education experts call “responsive classroom” techniques. The goal is to share important information in a welcoming way so your audience will respond well. A responsive teacher is sensitive to their audience’s needs and designs the learning situation to […]
A LIFE-CHANGING LESSON August 4, 2020 | John 3 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue I remember one thing from the third grade: my teacher, Mrs. Howard, liked me. Although long-division was very difficult, I was willing to tackle it because I wanted nothing more than to please Mrs. Howard. One day, I showed up to third […]
August 2, 2020 | Luke 6:17-38 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue Many of my college students are intimidated by the Teaching Elementary Math Methods course. They say, “I’m just not good at math. I’m worried I won’t be a good math teacher.” How did they develop such a negative mindset? My goal is that they will […]
June 20, 2020 | Psalm 51:1–17 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue Do you ever feel torn between repentance and praise? Pondering this issue, Bible scholar Michael E. Travers explained: “It is this tension between guilty sinner and righteous God that creates the paradox of praise in the penitential psalms. When God forgives the sinner for his […]
AS GOOD AS HIS WORD April 29, 2020 | Matthew 28:1–15 DEVOTIONS This Month’s Issue The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the linchpin of the Christian faith. “If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn’t rise from the dead, then why worry about any of […]